Handbrake Ditches XViD and DiVX Support Saying XViD is Obsolete (PCAuthority)

[Drew Wilson]

So why is HandBrake ditching AVI and XviD support when it's a format that's won such widespread acceptance? In the words of the developers;

"AVI is a rough beast. It is obsolete. It does not support modern container features like chapters, muxed-in subtitles, variable framerate video, or out of order frame display. Furthermore, HandBrake's AVI muxer is vanilla AVI 1.0 that doesn't even support large files. The code has not been actively maintained since 2005. Keeping it in the library while implementing new features means a very convoluted data pipeline, full of conditionals that make the code more difficult to read and maintain, and make output harder to predict. As such, it is now gone. It is not coming back, and good riddance."

"HandBrake, these days, is almost entirely about H.264 video, aka MPEG-4 Part 10. This makes it rather...superfluous to include two different encoders for an older codec, MPEG-4 Part 2. When choosing between FFmpeg's and XviD's, it came down to a matter of necessity. We need to include libavcodec (FFmpeg) for a bunch of other parts of its API, like decoding. Meanwhile, XviD's build system causes grief (it's the most common support query we get about compiling, after x264's requirement of yasm). Since we mainly use MPEG-4 Part 2 for testing/debugging, and recommend only H.264 for high quality encodes, XviD's undisputed quality edge over FFmpeg's encoder is inconsequential, while FFmpeg's speed edge over XviD is important to us."

More... (http://www.pcauthority.com.au/News/164982,handbrake-abandons-divx-for-ripping-dvds-should-you.aspx)

Yeah, everything is going to mobil devices. It's the new cool and hip thing to watch all your favorite movies and TV shows on screens the size of postage stamps.

[mountain_rage]

Was going to use it to convert movies from dvd to xvid for my hand held only to find out they nixed support. Did someone forget to remind them that people still convert files for other uses than home playback. Think I'll now try Auto GK instead.

[Signa]

That's fucking bullshit. They raise some good points, and I do use a lot more H264 these days, but the compatibility of AVI is so strong that I can expect to get the same results using an AVI file as a straight DVD. I've tried many times to mess with a .MP4 file, and every time it doesn't come out the way it should.

[Boomer The Dog]

Handbrake was one of the more popular encoders in Linux, but that decision put me off of using the new version there. My favorite is still AutoGK in Windows, and I learned about it here at Zeropaid! I had been using Gordian Knot to do the job.

[mountain_rage]

That is the program I ended up using as an alternative for creating xvid/divx Boomer, seems to to the job right. Now I just have to figure out why my portable doesn't like the way it creates its xvids. Runs fine on my computer but not on the portable.

[Signa]

most likely, its a codec issue MR. I was using xvid4PSP for a while and none of the files would play on the PSP, but would be just fine on the PC. I ended up uninstalling all my codecs, and then installed Combined Community Codec Pack. After that, everything was fine.

[mountain_rage]

most likely, its a codec issue MR. I was using xvid4PSP for a while and none of the files would play on the PSP, but would be just fine on the PC. I ended up uninstalling all my codecs, and then installed Combined Community Codec Pack. After that, everything was fine.

That is the codec pack I am using, I'll have to look into it, just a pain when it gets to this level as there are so many issues that might be to blame. Could be the color settings, frame rate, resolution, bitrate, etc...

[Signa]

You could try uninstalling it completely, and then go into your device manager and remove any other codecs listed there (Ninja edit: I can't find them there under windows 7 :'( ). I know codecs can be sticky after being removed, and worse, they can just not work even when you have them installed as you do. I guess a fresh install would be the best chance to fix things, but as I'm writing this, I'm remembering you just upgraded to Win7, so you probably already have a fresh-enough install, and I don't know why I need to hit the submit button on this post.

[mountain_rage]

You could try uninstalling it completely, and then go into your device manager and remove any other codecs listed there (Ninja edit: I can't find them there under windows 7 :'( ). I know codecs can be sticky after being removed, and worse, they can just not work even when you have them installed as you do. I guess a fresh install would be the best chance to fix things, but as I'm writing this, I'm remembering you just upgraded to Win7, so you probably already have a fresh-enough install, and I don't know why I need to hit the submit button on this post.

To increase your post count and help revive the forum by posting.

The file plays on my handheld, it just has some weird psychedelic pattern over all moving objects, making me thing it has to do with the color settings. People have complained that the player has poor format support, so maybe my player only supports RGB or one of the numerous other settings. Still hoping someone ports one of the other ARM 9 video players to it, it would make my life easier, but until then I'll have to figure out the problem.

[Signa]

It probably more had to do with the fact that I wrote out most of it and decided to finish the post anyway so the effort wasn't wasted. There's also the fact that other people may read it too, so it might help them.

I can't say I know much about color settings. I've never messed with them.

[mountain_rage]

Hmmm, I don't see any color settings to change... I'm sure I'll figure it out eventually I just need time to sit down and look up the issues present with my handheld.

[Mels_Smileys45]

uh oh! A spam bumper of old threads! BTW, Screw xvid and avi! I am trying to replace all of them with mp4's. Looks so much better even at smaller sizes.

[Boomer The Dog]

I think that mp4 is good quality, I didn't think it was that good at first, with pausing on side motion, like the video would stick for milliseconds. I like it a lot of putting stuff up on Youtube though.

Xvid is the thing for file uploading though, it still has more support on all kinds of devices, kind of like why people still use mp3 when there are newer, better formats.

Because of the patent landfill, I wouldn't leave Xvid formats just yet either. People might be chased back to something older like Xvid if x264 is attacked heavily, like its use in mkv.

I've seen some stuff in mkv and like the features it gave, plus the quality (720p). If I use x264 or mp4, which is the most open codec combo to use, something that's not benefiting some corporation or controlled by them, but is also the best for playback support right now?

I really should research this, woof.